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Another Medical Kidnapping

Dreambirdie

work in progress
Messages
5,569
Location
N. California
"...stated his belief..."

People in power always have a narrative which they use to justify their atrocities. Always. Narrative plus power and arrogance. And then the herd of course does the rest. We've never left the Dark Ages. We have more indoor plumbing and fewer fleas, but intellectually?

So well said. Yes, the Dark Ages have never left us.

What will it take to dethrone this vile ugly system, whose power brokers are usually much more "mentally ill" than the rest of us?

I feel helpless, and see no way out for Justina, or anyone else who dares to take their child to the ER. Taking your chances with remedies from the internet seems a much safer option.
 

natasa778

Senior Member
Messages
1,774
So well said. Yes, the Dark Ages have never left us.

What will it take to dethrone this vile ugly system, whose power brokers are usually much more "mentally ill" than the rest of us?

I feel helpless, and see no way out for Justina, or anyone else who dares to take their child to the ER. Taking your chances with remedies from the internet seems a much safer option.

Sadly this is very true. One is reminded to never ever share anything about their or their children's health with 'professionals' of any kind unless absolutely necessary.

As for those who carried out this witchhunt, I can only say that I hope there is Hell out there waiting for them ..
 

leela

Senior Member
Messages
3,290
It appears the parents are being persecuted for refusing the new diagnosis and treatment.

This is dangerously parallel to the trend I see where police handcuff and arrest (often violently)
people who have not actually broken any specific code, and are then arrested for "resisting arrest" and "disobeying a police officer."
Both of which one would naturally do when being wrongly treated or accused.

There is a paradigm here, almost an entrainment to make people ever more compliant out of fear of this unreasonable power structure.
 

leela

Senior Member
Messages
3,290
"Do things that would make any sane person rail and resist, then point to how "unreasonable" and "resistant" they are."

Exactly! I once worked in a State mental hospital where people were incarcerated by fiat, not with any due process. As staff, I had to attend sessions regarding each patient I interacted with. The psychiatrist was a sadist. One man had been put in there because he had threatened violence to his wife, the daughter of the richest people around, and not the man they had wanted her to marry. She, herself, said he had never been violent against her.

This psychiatrist would say things designed to provoke anger from the man and if he responded normally, the pscyhiatrist would say he had to stay another 6 weeks because of anger issues. When he did not respond to the provocation, the shrink would say he had to stay another 6 weeks because he was repressing his normal emotions.

When I left that job the man had already been in there for more than 6 months. His wife testified that her parents were just trying to keep them apart and were pressuring her to divorce him before they let him out.

arrgh! i just can't hit the "like" button that makes me so mad!!
 

Roy S

former DC ME/CFS lobbyist
Messages
1,376
Location
Illinois, USA

This seems quite relevant to the case and has comments from our own Suzy Chapman.
 
Mental health and what is normal.
by Allen Frances, M.D.
 
Why Did DSM 5 Botch Somatic Symptom Disorder?
 
"This is the third in a series of blogs on the trouble caused by DSM 5's mishandling of the boundary between medical and mental illness.
The first explored how a new and untested DSM 5 diagnosis - 'Somatic Symptom Disorder (SSD)' - would mislabel millions of people as mentally ill when they are really just medically ill."
 
http://www.psychologytoday.com/blog.../why-did-dsm-5-botch-somatic-symptom-disorder
 

Roy S

former DC ME/CFS lobbyist
Messages
1,376
Location
Illinois, USA
This reminds me of One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest

This psychiatrist would say things designed to provoke anger from the man and if he responded normally, the pscyhiatrist would say he had to stay another 6 weeks because of anger issues. When he did not respond to the provocation, the shrink would say he had to stay another 6 weeks because he was repressing his normal emotions.

quote]
 

Ren

.
Messages
385
If it's any help, people, including children, can appeal to the UN when their rights have been ignored:
http://www.savethechildren.net/what-we-do/child-rights-governance

normally that body is a bit useless, but it could be worth trying, since US courts are also being backwards.

This is a possible avenue for Katrina, too, and the others.


Please allow me to preface the following UN info by saying that I understand that the group, CCHR is questioned bc of funding by the Church of Scientology. I am not a Scientologist (sp??). I see that CCHR can be sensational and is not an academic source. If anyone sees info that is incorrect, please of course say.

That said, this* CCHR link mentions Pelletier and another tragic case. But brings up the UN as well, and I too wondered how it might apply to Karina Hansen. I haven't looked further into or checked this info, but for what it's worth I'll list what caught my eye - should it prove helpful.


"2013 United Nations special report on Torture and Other Cruel or Degrading Treatment or Punishment...
The 2013 UN special report clearly identifies human rights violations such as:

1. “[M]edical treatments of an intrusive and irreversible nature, when lacking a therapeutic purpose may constitute torture or ill-treatment when enforced or administered without the free and informed consent of the person concerned.

2. “Medical care that causes severe suffering for no justifiable reason can be considered cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment, and if there is State involvement and specific intent, it is torture.

3. “Forced interventions, often wrongfully justified by theories of incapacity and therapeutic necessity [are] inconsistent with the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities.

4. “[D]eprivation of liberty that is based on the grounds of a disability and that inflicts severe pain or suffering could fall under the scope of the Convention against Torture. In making such an assessment, factors such as fear and anxiety produced by indefinite detention, the infliction of forced medication or electroshock, the use of restraints and seclusion, the segregation from family and community, etc., should be taken into account.”

*http://www.cchrint.org/2014/03/18/p...ive-services-abducting-and-drugging-children/
 

SOC

Senior Member
Messages
7,849
One sad and appalling feature of this case is that in the US the doctors/hospital/courts could not do this (legally) if Justina was an adult. In order to force institutionalization for psychiatric reasons for more than a couple of days, it would have to be proved that the adult person was an immediate danger to themselves or others -- which basically means immediate danger of violence, not even the potential for or thoughts of violence. That does not include not taking appropriate care of one's health, which is considered a matter of personal choice even when it's an extremely poor choice.

Children, however, don't get the same respect because their cases don't go through the same legal path. In the case of children, the psychiatric institutionalization is done not according to a personal or public safety or health argument, but as a "child abuse" argument. Suddenly it's not necessary to prove immediate danger to themselves or others, just that the parents are not giving the treatment some psychiatrists believe (not scientifically prove) is correct for the child. It is not even a question of immediate harm to the child, such as might be the case with emergency treatment for injury or severe infection.

Whatever the true medical situation is with Justina, it seems highly unlikely that the treatment her parents were giving her through Tufts was an immediate danger to Justina. If it was, Tufts should be in serious legal trouble.
 

Iquitos

Senior Member
Messages
513
Location
Colorado
True, they may not be able to do it legally in the US, but they still do it. The law says they can do this if two physicians sign a statement that the person in question is a danger to himself or others. I personally have seen someone forceably taken to the State mental hospital for 6 weeks "observation" because he talked about punching out someone who abused him verbally. In order to get out he had to agree to take psychotropic meds -- after all, they had to justify keeping him there. Although he had/has none of the symptoms, the psych there diagnosed him as "schizophrenic" and prescribed a drug that made him cry all the time. Once he got out and quit taking the drug, that stopped.

After the hearing, which I attended, I SAW a deputy sheriff hurl him down a flight of stairs while he was handcuffed with his hands behind his back and a cop on each side. The deputy, who was the verbal abuser, claimed he tried to "escape" -- an outright lie. The prisoner suffered a hernia from the fall and had to have surgery to correct it.

The last I heard the new DSM was trying to get the law changed to only one doctor required to do this. And I have seen cases, mainly in the South, where "judges" (elected good 'ole boys who don't have a legal education) grant these motions. They are often later found to be in error and are reversed, but that's too late for the people they have already harmed.
 

SOC

Senior Member
Messages
7,849
True, they may not be able to do it legally in the US, but they still do it. The law says they can do this if two physicians sign a statement that the person in question is a danger to himself or others. I personally have seen someone forceably taken to the State mental hospital for 6 weeks "observation" because he talked about punching out someone who abused him verbally. In order to get out he had to agree to take psychotropic meds -- after all, they had to justify keeping him there. Although he had/has none of the symptoms, the psych there diagnosed him as "schizophrenic" and prescribed a drug that made him cry all the time. Once he got out and quit taking the drug, that stopped.

After the hearing, which I attended, I SAW a deputy sheriff hurl him down a flight of stairs while he was handcuffed with his hands behind his back and a cop on each side. The deputy, who was the verbal abuser, claimed he tried to "escape" -- an outright lie. The prisoner suffered a hernia from the fall and had to have surgery to correct it.

The last I heard the new DSM was trying to get the law changed to only one doctor required to do this. And I have seen cases, mainly in the South, where "judges" (elected good 'ole boys who don't have a legal education) grant these motions. They are often later found to be in error and are reversed, but that's too late for the people they have already harmed.
There's no question that there's always abuse -- in every system. Still, they had to be able to document he was an immediate threat to himself, someone else, or the public. Depending on the nature of his threats, they may have had that legal documentation.

And yes, the South does seem to have a greater number of legal abuses due to the good ole boy system still in place in many rural areas, but it happens in other places as well.

Since you are an independent witness to the abuse of a prisoner, I hope you filed a complaint.
 

Ren

.
Messages
385
South-bashing and widespread and accepted stereotyping is part of why many Southerners would gladly leave the union.
 

Iquitos

Senior Member
Messages
513
Location
Colorado
There's no question that there's always abuse -- in every system. Still, they had to be able to document he was an immediate threat to himself, someone else, or the public. Depending on the nature of his threats, they may have had that legal documentation.

And yes, the South does seem to have a greater number of legal abuses due to the good ole boy system still in place in many rural areas, but it happens in other places as well.

Since you are an independent witness to the abuse of a prisoner, I hope you filed a complaint.

No, they didn't document anything. They simply abused their positions of power to do this without any documentation at all.

I did not put myself in harms way by filing a complaint. Just as in other cases, those who try to defend the abused often get threatened with the same treatment. I had already experienced abuse by the racist doctor who instigated this scenario. He didn't like it because I, a white person, associated with non-whites. He actually commented on this to other medical personel while I was being admitted to the emergency room. He, and the racist cop, used their positions to try to inforce racial segregation and racism against the prisoner, who also associated with non-whites.

Being a person who judges others on the content of their character and on their intellectual capacity, instead of the color of their skin -- this was the "threat" these guys were against. If the doctor and the cop were to be judged by the content of their character and/or their intellectual capacity, they would both be definite losers. They didn't want their positions of white male superiority challenged. If this doctor had been, for instance, a black woman, he would never have got into medical school let alone graduated. As it was, he had to repeat one year. He later lost his license due to too many malpractice suits, and went back to ranching where he should have stayed in the first place.

My only solution was to move to a state where this kind of behavior is not commonly accepted.